The present invention relates to a packaging assembly comprising a fluid dispenser and a housing in which the fluid dispenser is inserted.
Such a housing or box can be used in the fields of cosmetics or of perfumes to contain a dispenser so as to protect it and also so as to facilitate storing it in a stack. Such boxes or housings are generally rectangular block shaped with one side of the rectangular block forming a hinged opening. Such a housing conventionally has a top, a bottom, two sides, a back wall, and an opening front. The dispenser is, in general, received inside the housing in totally free manner, i.e. it can move to a very limited extent inside the housing. When the user wishes to take hold of the fluid dispenser, the user opens the opening front of the housing, and takes hold of the dispenser for the purpose of pulling it out of the housing.
Since the fluid dispenser is merely disposed inside the housing, it can move inside said housing and knock against its inside walls. Such impacts can not only damage the dispenser, they can also generate noise which may be undesirable under certain circumstances.
An object of the present invention is to remedy those drawbacks of the prior art by defining a packaging assembly in which the fluid dispenser is held stationary inside the housing, without complicating extracting the dispenser from the housing.
To solve this problem, the present invention provides a packaging assembly comprising: a fluid dispenser defining substantially parallel and preferably relatively thin opposite side edges; and a housing having two substantially parallel opposite sides; each side defining an inside wall, with the two inside walls facing each other, and each inside wall being provided with a respective longitudinal groove which extends over at least a portion of the length of the side, the two resulting grooves being parallel, at least a portion of each of the opposite side edges of the dispenser being slidably engaged in the corresponding one of said grooves in the housing, so as to enable the dispenser to be slidably extracted from the housing. Firstly it should be specified that the term xe2x80x9chousingxe2x80x9d should not be understood to be limiting. On the contrary, this term is used to designate any closed or open packaging in which the fluid dispenser is inserted in grooves formed by the two opposite sides. For example, the opposite sides may be interconnected merely by spacers, so that the fluid dispenser is visible from almost any angle. It is also possible to imagine other forms of housing with or without a top, with or without a back wall, and with or without an opening front wall. The essential condition for the housing lies in the fact that it has two opposite sides forming longitudinal grooves for slidably receiving the opposite edges of the fluid dispenser.
It should also be noted that extracting the dispenser from the housing is not made any more complicated by the fact that the edges of the dispenser slide in the grooves in the housing. On the contrary, the dispenser is guided accurately by the grooves so that it is extracted more linearly.
In one embodiment, the housing includes a back wall interconnecting the two sides at one end of each them, and an opening front at their other ends, and a top interconnecting the sides and the back wall. In which case, the housing does not have a bottom, but a bottom is however formed for it by a bottom of the dispenser, so that the bottom of the dispenser is visible when the dispenser is in its housing.
In addition, the dispenser may include a removable closure element closing off a fluid dispensing orifice, said closure element being defined by a line of least resistance. Advantageously, the closure element defines a portion of each of the opposite side edges of the dispenser, which portion is engaged in the grooves in the housing.
In a first practical embodiment, the housing includes a bottom which is parallel to said top and which interconnects the sides and the back wall.
In an alternative embodiment, only the opposite side edges of the closure element are engaged in the grooves of the housing. Advantageously, the grooves define respective abutment ends in the vicinity of the opening front so that the dispenser can be partially extracted from the housing, with its closure element remaining inside, blocked by the opposite edges of the closure element coming into abutment against the abutment ends of the grooves. Preferably, the bottom of the housing has an inside face over which the dispenser extends when it is in the housing, and an outside face over which the dispenser extends when it is outside the housing, after it has been rotated through approximately 180xc2x0 about the line of least resistance of the closure element which remains blocked in the grooves inside the housing.
In a practical embodiment, the dispenser is provided with a draw tongue extending from the end opposite from the closure element at the opening front of the housing when the dispenser is inside the housing, so that it is possible to take hold of the tongue and to pull the dispenser out of the housing. Advantageously, the draw tongue is adapted to close off the opening front of the housing.
A user who wishes to use such a packaging assembly starts by opening the housing by pivoting the tongue of the dispenser. Then, the user pulls on the tongue to extract the dispenser from the housing. The user continues to pull until the opposite side edges of the closure element engaged in the grooves come into abutment against the abutment ends of the grooves. The dispenser is then extracted from the housing to the maximum extent. The user, who continues to hold the dispenser by its tongue, then causes the dispenser to pivot through 180xc2x0 so as to bring the bottom face of the dispenser (which face is initially in contact with the inside face of the bottom of the housing) into contact with the outside face of the bottom of the housing. Said outside face of the bottom then serves as backing against which the dispenser can abut when the user actuates the dispenser. The user can then either leave the dispenser outside its housing, or else perform the above-mentioned operations in the reverse order so as to insert the dispenser back into its housing.
In an advantageous embodiment, the dispenser has a substantially flat side and a shaped-section opposite side defining a deformable actuating wall. In which case, the outside face of the bottom of the housing serves as abutment backing when the user deforms the actuating wall by pushing it in.